It is amazing how quickly I can get into a normal routine. The last couple of mornings, I have been up by 5 or 5:30 AM local time and the first thing I do (other than pee) is pick up the laptop, go up to the cockpit and type in my entry about the day before. It would probably have made more sense to do it in the evenings when we anchored but, I tell ya, once you get to your destination, explore, shower and cook dinner, you’re pretty tired…well, I am at least. And all we really want to do is to sit in the pit and look at the beauty around us.
And stop number two is no exception to that beauty. We left Turtle Bay around 7 or 7:30 AM yesterday with our sights (and our GPS) set to Nara Inlet at Hook Island. According to our “bible” from Sunsail, this inlet is well protected from winds on all sides and is a fantastic anchorage with the North/Northeast winds we were having. According to the book, there are ancient Aboriginese caves with writings in this inlet. We were also excited because it would allow for a longer sail than the day before. Approximately 8 miles of sailing. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot (and we had to motor for a good hour and a half through channels before we reached our staging area), but we were at a close reach into the wind which had us making long tacks along the way.
But what a fantastic sail we had! I took care of motoring us to our staging area (this is where you actually put up your sails) while Todd prepped lines, checked in with Sunsail during roll call at 8:45 and called Tay. He said she was really excited to hear from him and asked really good questions about our trip. I think it amazed her that, when the sun says goodbye to her, it says hello to us (he came up with that and it is so cute). She also asked how we eat and where we sleep. Very cute.
Back to our sail! It was awesome. Once we got the sails up (the main halyard is a pain to get up, poor Todd), we were on our way and maintaining around 5 to 6 knots in open water. The water was a bit choppy with pretty nice sized swells. One made it to the pit and doused me at the helm – but it sure felt great! We did some nice tacking and looked like pros! I was really proud of us (and, yes, all day and night I checked my frustration at the door!).
And then we found it. It has become the new feature that must now be on every boat we charter (and probably would be) – autopilot!! Unbelievable! So, get this. Once we tack and we set up to the wind the way we want, I check auto and poof! The boat stays on that course. If the wind shifts slightly, there are plus and minus 1 and 10 buttons that you can adjust the course and the boat does the rest. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you can go downstairs and take a siesta. But it does mean that I can move away from behind the wheel and sit on the deck watching for other boats or…ummm…sunning myself. Which was awesome!
The weather was perfect – a few rain clouds behind us, blue skies in front. The wind only shifted slightly but stay consistent at North/Northeast. Our Garmin GPS system is our best friend and rides with me at the helm. The pink line shows us the way. Todd plots our route in the AM and inputs it into the GPS system. How did people do it before GPS…Mom?
Along our sail, we unfortunately had to keep the engine running in neutral. We are having challenges with our fridge. This is like a nasty flashback to San Diego when we had issues with that one as well. There has got to be a better way. The problem this time is that our boat is provisioned with food the whole time we are here. That means frozen meats! That is my biggest concern. They all thawed overnight in Turtle Bay. At first my reaction was that everything was ruined because there is no way we could eat everything in one night. However, I thought, maybe if we cook all the meat that has thawed, we could just use them as leftovers. As long as they stay cold (not frozen), we should be ok for about a week. So, we decided that there would be a cook-a-thon that night on the boat.
We also decided that we needed to talk to Sunsail about this problem. We are paying enough money that our fridge should work and not ruin our provisioning, which wasn’t cheap either. So Todd radioed base and they said they would bring someone out to take a look. About 3 miles out of Nara Inlet, our Sunsail guy arrived in a chaser boat. Basically, one guy is driving while the other guy hops onto the side of your boat. Pretty cool!
He was down in the galley for quite a bit and I felt very sorry for him. It gets hot as hell down there when the hatches are closed – and we close them to sail. So he got his sweat on for sure! Turns out it is the pump. He gave it a couple of bangs and told us to do the same until we make our way back to Hamilton Island (which we are doing today). He said that it should get colder and for us to check out the situation once we settle in Nara Inlet (we had our sails down and motor on at this point to get him on board).
So we motored on in to Nara Inlet. It is a tricky route with a lot of coral on either side so it was a slow ride. We decided on an anchorage, not all the way in to the very point of the inlet, but a bit back. We had to drop anchor a couple of times until we both felt comfortable about our destination. We have to take into account depth and coral so it took a couple of tries. However, every try went well and our final anchor was beautiful.
Once anchored, we took a breather and checked the fridge. It was colder but not as it should have been with the amount of time the engine was running to get to our anchorage. We decided that we would pack it with the remaining ice we had in our coolers when we returned. So we headed to check out the Aboriginal cave. The Aussie Park Department has built steps leading up to the cave so that it is easier to get to. We jumped in Timmy (our tender) with G. Roam (our traveling gnome) and headed over.
When you are in the tender traveling close to land in this beautiful country, you almost feel like you are on one of those Discovery nature shows. We made it to the very small, mostly rock beach and anchored our tender. Todd and I both wore flip flops (even though the book said good footwear) and found that (or at least I did) that we should have worn tennis shoes or something. The steps were made of rock, like a path you would follow on the side of a mountain. The steps were uneven, smooth and sometimes a little slick under my ill advised flip flops! And the book says that, anyone in reasonable health should have no problem climbing this path. Agreed, I suppose. But I feel I am in very good health and I was huffin’! And sweating like crazy!
We made it to the cave and saw the writings on the wall. It was pretty cool. I don’t know what I was expecting but it was pretty cool. If nothing else we got a great work out! There is an electric fence that surrounds the cave which is to keep, what the book calls, “local art loving goats” out. You would understand if you saw the inlet. Many rocks have been carved into with people’s names or their boat names and years. Most look like are from the 70’s and the 80’s. We didn’t see any from more recent years. So I am sure they are trying to preserve this ancient cave and the writings that you can still see on the walls.
On our way back to Dreamer, we took the tender along the remaining east side of the inlet. The rocks are so cool – almost volcanic. And the vegetation so rich! It was a nice cruise.
Once we returned to our boat, we hopped on board and decided on showers. We were sweating like crazy and wanted to get cleaned up for the evening. After our showers, we decided on a couple of cold beers and talked about a plan for the food. All of the chicken had thawed so we knew we needed to cook that – two of which were marinating for dinner. So we started our dinner first which was the leftover spaghetti, marinated chicken (I marinated it in Italian dressing), and a salad. While we ate, Todd cooked the remaining 6 chicken breasts just plain and on the grill at the back of our boat. With them being plain, we can use them in salads, with BBQ sauce, chili sauce or wrapped in a tortilla as fajitas.
While everything was cooking, I reorganized our refrigerator and added the remaining bags of ice. It turns out that some of the red meat thawed while others didn’t. So we decided that we would hold off until it all thawed (hopefully today) before we cooked it. We did check in with Sunsail yesterday evening to let them know that the fridge still didn’t seem to be reaching its full potential. We told them that we were planning on returning to base at some point today. So they said they would have a look and try to replace parts or whatever they need to do or they would transfer us to another boat. I hope we get to stay with Dreamer. She has become a part of our family! We will see, I suppose.
We went to bed pretty early again – sailing really takes it out of you! Probably the sun does too. We are both pretty tan (and, in some places, red) already so I am sure it is the sun doing it as well. Todd got up around 3 or so because our rigging was making a ton of noise on the mast. I don’t know what he did to fix it but I haven’t heard it since. I got up about 5:30 this morning and, like I mentioned before, I grabbed the laptop and made my way up here on the deck.
This morning there are some thick cloud cover but the sun is just now winning the battle. It is coming up behind me right now and feels great. I have been listening to the cockatoos and other tropical birds sing their morning songs. The water is very still and, every now and then, I hear something disturb the surface. By the time I look it is merely rings around where…wait a second!!! I think I just heard a goat!! Remember when I told you what the book said about the cave and art loving goats? I thought “goats” was an Aussie word for people of some sort (like blokes or whatever). But I think there are goats on this island!! I swear I heard a goat – TWICE! Huh. We will need to check with the locals.
Anyway, Todd is still sleeping and I think I am going to go get ready for the day. Hmm, what shall I wear…a bathing suit maybe?? Haha! Probably. And I will need to be sure to sunscreen and cover my back. When I am at the helm, my back seems to be right in line with the sun. I want a tan and I don’t want to peel so I will need to make adjustments to my wardrobe today.
Today’s destination is Hamilton Island to replenish ice and whatever else we might need. We haven’t decided if we will head back out after that or spend an evening there. I am sure it will depend a lot on the situation with our fridge.
And, my hair? Think slept on wet + humidity and you will know that it is quite the au natural look!
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